Gus Van Sant Drinks 'Kool-Aid', of the Electric, Acid Variety

I'm really, really trying to remain positive about this little bit of news. Now, I know that Gus Van Sant was responsible for Drugstore Cowboy and To Die For -- both solidly interesting book adaptations, but he really singed a sore spot into me with Even Cowgirls Get the Blues. I had missed the movie originally, but was determined to see it after reading the book; it wasn't at my local video store, so I ended up over-paying for a copy and regretting it ever since -- and I even like Uma Thurman! Between that experience and James Rocchi's questionable review of Van Sant's Paranoid Park, I just don't know what to think about his next adapted feature -- Tom Wolfe's classic The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.

At the very least, this will get him out of the kid rut James spoke of, but does Van Sant still have the chops to pull it off? Could this be anywhere near as good as the adaptation of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (which came out a few years after Acid)? Dustin Lance Black (Big Love writer ) is going to pen the script, and the pic will be produced by Richard Gladstein. If you're not familiar with the book, it's Wolfe's attempt to capture, on paper, the drug-addled minds of Ken Kesey (writer of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest) and his Merry Pranksters. It follows the group as they drive across country, from California to the World's Fair in New York, in a DayGlo-painted bus while on psychedelic drugs like LSD.

A little background: the rights to Acid Test were bought by Alfred Roven years ago. While filmmakers met with him to try and get the text on-screen, the attempts failed. After his death, Gladstein was introduced to Roven's children and the rights were finally opened to a producer. Why, oh why Mr. Gladstein, isn't Terry Gilliam behind this, especially after Fear and Loathing? Sigh -- what's done is done. Are you excited about this latest adaptation? Or, does it make you want to cower between the pages of Wolfe's writing or hunt wildly for psychedelics to wipe the memory away?